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posted by janrinok on Tuesday June 19 2018, @03:25PM   Printer-friendly
from the suffer-the-little-children dept.

Researchers report in areas with greater numbers of Christian fundamentalists, infant mortality rates are higher than in areas with more mainstream Christians. The study reveals external factors such as lack of social support, birth defects, poverty and lack of insurance, in addition to religious conviction, are the main reasons for the increased mortality rates.

The odds of an infant dying before their first birthday are higher in counties with greater proportions of conservative Protestants, especially fundamentalists, than in counties with more mainline Protestants and Catholics, according to a new Portland State University study The study, published online in May in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, supports the idea that the more insular, anti-institutional culture of fundamentalists can lead to poorer health outcomes.

Ginny Garcia-Alexander, a sociology professor in PSU's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the study's lead author, examined the influence of religion on postneonatal infant mortality rates, or the number of deaths from four weeks through the first year, using data from 1990 through 2010. Garcia-Alexander said a leading cause of infant death in the first 28 days is birth defects, which can be heavily influenced by advances in medical knowledge and technology. By contrast, deaths in the next 11 months of life are more often linked to external factors such as poverty, lack of insurance, social support networks and religion.

Garcia-Alexander said the findings mirror trends seen in adult mortality rates, where areas with more mainline Protestants and Catholics had better health outcomes than areas with more conservative Protestants.

The study's findings build on previous research that says that Catholicism and mainline Protestantism are civically minded, externally oriented faiths that emphasize community-level care. For example, church-affiliated hospitals and social-service providers such as Catholic Charities can bolster the health infrastructure of local communities.

Source: https://neurosciencenews.com/infant-mortality-fundamentalism-9165/


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  • (Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Wednesday June 20 2018, @12:55AM (3 children)

    by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Wednesday June 20 2018, @12:55AM (#695395)

    I thought I just got done debunking this a week or two ago?

    I seem to remember you doing a little goalpost-shifting and some appeals to authority (Jesus in this case) but debunking? No.

    All Jesus ever says is "Soon"

    So 2,000 years or so is not "soon" yet? Apart from the Biblical quotes others have posted that show how wrong you are.

    To be fair, arguing about what Jesus may have said is a little like arguing about what Hercules may have said. He may have existed and said those things, but frankly the evidence is so thin that sensible people take the view that he's just another myth.

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  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 20 2018, @03:20AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 20 2018, @03:20AM (#695434)

    Also consider "soon" in relation to the proposed cosmology. From the creation to the birth of the savior was 5,000 years, right? (It's been a /very/ long time since I cared to study the bible.) The birth of the savior is our calendar epoch, so we easily know how long it's been. 29% of the supposed lifetime of the universe (assuming the world ends tomorrow) has been spent waiting for "then" to become "now"... "soon."

    • (Score: 2) by Arik on Wednesday June 20 2018, @04:30AM

      by Arik (4543) on Wednesday June 20 2018, @04:30AM (#695449) Journal
      "From the creation to the birth of the savior was 5,000 years, right?"

      The short answer is "no."

      The Bible does not contain a chronology or timeline, and nowhere does it give the number you seek, nor any combination of numbers that can be reliably used to generate that number. Many biblical scholars have tried very hard to extract such a number, and the truth of the preceding sentence can be seen in the fact that they have come up with many different numbers (1CE is variously reckoned as 3644, 4004, 4164, 4244, 4991, 5199, or possibly another date, depending on who you ask.) Each of those numbers is based on combining numbers from selected biblical texts with unwarranted assumptions that cannot be proven (and are likely incorrect.)

      Remove the assumptions and you're left with a fact - the number you are looking for simply is not there.

      --
      If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
  • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday June 20 2018, @03:46PM

    by tangomargarine (667) on Wednesday June 20 2018, @03:46PM (#695631)

    some appeals to authority (Jesus in this case)

    Well after that "0 for 3" comment Azumi dropped, I thought I'd take a crack at the one falsifiable statement of the three. Turns out I was wrong, interestingly. Well, at least I got a few minutes of Internet research done to occupy my time.

    So 2,000 years or so is not "soon" yet?

    Not if you buy the whole billions of years or whatever that evolution says, which most Christians these days do, I would think.

    To be fair, arguing about what Jesus may have said is a little like arguing about what Hercules may have said. He may have existed and said those things, but frankly the evidence is so thin that sensible people take the view that he's just another myth.

    Usually when these arguments come up, I'm not so much trying to convert anybody as set the record straight. If you're going to criticize religion, at least make sure you're criticizing something that the religion in question actually believes. There's a book here that pretty much every Christian accepts as authoritative,* so that seems like a good place to start.

    Yes, I was raised Lutheran, but I don't follow that stuff anymore. I've just got most of the knowledge from way too many years of private school stuck in my brain.

    *yes, infallibility is another issue, but at least it's better than "some cardinal five hundred years ago said so"

    --
    "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"